The Indian Express (Delhi Edition)
‘Patriotism must come from within. Can you ask an East Bengal fan to cheer for a bad pass?’
ANIRBANA DASGUPTA has an opinion on everything — from the state of education in West Bengal to the recent Supreme Court order on the national anthem — and a football analogy for each.
The Class 11 student of Maria’s Day School in Howrah says he wants to get out of West Bengal in 2017 because “the state just doesn’t offer the same options anymore. It’s like a football team with great forwards, but a bad goalkeeper and even worse defenders. In some fields, West Bengal is still the best and probably will be, but the rest, not so much. We don’t get jobs here even after studying a lot. So what’s the point? Think about it — if I were to apply to college after this, where would I go? Jadavpur University, maybe? Compare that to Delhi, where almost every university is the best in the country.”
An avid footballer, a voracious reader and a self-confessed science geek, Anirbana says he has avoided films in movie halls since the national anthem order.
“Of course, I will stand up for the anthem if that’s the law. But if I am going to watch a movie for the Sunny Leone item number in it, I am not in a very patriotic mood, am I? Feelings of patriotism should come from within. I mean, you can’t ask an East Bengal fan to cheer for a bad pass which costs the team a goal, can you?”
Anirbana grew up in the family’s ancestral home on Danesh Sheikh Lane, once famous as the junction connecting Howrah to the capital across the river. His father is a teacher and his mother a homemaker.
Anirbana’s room is plastered with posters of Manchester United and Cristiano Ronaldo. Footballs, of various size and colours, litter the floor and a grass-covered pair of football shoes lie in a corner of his room.
At the same time, Anirbana has more than football on his mind. He hopes to study computer science — “somewhere outside Bengal” — and start working soon after. “I want to work in the IT industry. There was a lot of hue and cry about an IT hub in Bengal. But Bangalore is still the place to go to. So maybe I will try and get a job there eventually. I’m looking forward to living there — it will be quite different from Howrah.”
Anirbana admits he “made up my mind” on Bangalore only two weeks ago. Before that, it was Delhi and a month before that, Mumbai. “Just away from here,” he explains. “Studying in Kolkata and living in Howrah, On Nov 30, in an interim order, the Supreme Court said “all the cinema halls in India shall play the national anthem before the feature film starts and all present in the hall are obliged to stand up to show respect” as a part of their “sacred obligation” you realise how different things are even between Kolkata and here. The first mall to come up here was years after the malls in Kolkata. Everything happens later here; we are always playing catch-up.”
On Friday evening, Anirbana was in a bad mood. His daily trip to the nearby football ground had not been very fruitful. His team had conceded three goals. “Nothing went according to plan. We kept on conceding goals, ones that we should have stopped. Our best players have all left to study elsewhere. That is part of the reason why we lost,” he says.
ANIRUDDHA GHOSAL